Abstract
The paper analyzes a competitive position of Serbia as a destination in the regional tourism market. The regional market includes Serbia's neighboring countries enhanced by Austria, Slovenia and Greece to provide a better view of the competitive landscape of the Southeast European region, herein termed the 'Extended Balkans'. The gap analysis was applied to the selected number of global secondary indices to highlight the differential effects that impact Serbia's position in different domains and categories, which in turn, has a profound effect on Serbia's ability to attract, delight and retain visitors. The emphasis of this theoretical paper is placed on the concept and methodology rather than on the selection of indices. The paper caters to both practitioners and academics by contributing to the literature on destination competitiveness through the lens of the positioning theory.
Highlights
In today’s tourism destination marketplace, countries are increasingly striving to attract more visitors, fulfill their expectations and prompt them to talk about their impressions and, repeat their positive experience
In 2016, Northern Europe, Central and Eastern Europe, and Southern Mediterranean showed an increase in arrivals by 6%, 4% and 1% respectively (UNWTO, 2017)
Serbia inevitably finds itself in the middle of the tourism market that is substantially growing, but the question remains as to whether it is maximizing its opportunities in comparison to the region and, global trends
Summary
In today’s tourism destination marketplace, countries are increasingly striving to attract more visitors, fulfill their expectations and prompt them to talk about their impressions and, repeat their positive experience. Serbia inevitably finds itself in the middle of the tourism market that is substantially growing, but the question remains as to whether it is maximizing its opportunities in comparison to the region and, global trends. The problem with many countries is the lack of index measurement system in place that will track a country’s position against the competition (Dupeyras & MacCallum, 2013). The argument supports the notion that every country is comprised of a unique set of features and attributes that constitute its identity Those attributes constitute an authentic perception that creates an image offered to visitors. In addition to the TTCI indicator, we propose several additional global empirical indicators to take part in measuring, evaluating and tracking of Serbia’s performance as a tourism destination. The emphasis is on the gap analysis for tracking and interpreting the difference between optimal points in order to better formulate point-of-parity and point-of-difference evaluations and strategies
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